Travelling in this Skin
by in48frames
Summary: Space AU & Fake Married. "No. Absolutely not." "It's the only way to get the information we need. The IIs don't trust anyone without a mate. I've already told them you'll be coming with me."
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** _I really wanted to write Fake Married and I couldn't make it work in canon/on Earth sooo Space AU was born. The basic concept of the ships comes from my vague memories of reading Glow by Amy Kathleen Ryan and A Million Suns by Beth Revis a few years ago. They all have their canon accents and emotionally we're somewhere near the end of S1, but the timeline gets a little muddy. Title and lyrics are from Travelling by Folly & the Hunter. I hope someone reads this!_

* * *

 _Sometimes life can feel like it's just dragging on.  
That is just your fear, though; there is nothing wrong.  
Deep within the colour, I have found a friend.  
I catch myself praying I don't lose her in the end._

Of course, she refused at first.

"No. Absolutely not." Rachel was banging around in her cupboard with her back to him, before turning around and brushing past him in the miniscule space between the bed and the wall. She did something-or-other behind him, then pushed by again back to her cupboard. She was stalling.

Chandler knew she'd say yes eventually. This was too important. "It's the only way to get the information we need. The IIs don't trust anyone without a mate. I've already told them you'll be coming with me."

It was strange, the way each Earthship had developed its own very specific social systems. Their own Earthship V had a casual attitude toward relationships and marriage, preferring the proliferation of the species to a focus on the morality of non-marital relations, but Earthship II was almost militant in enforcing monogamy. When Chandler and Jeter had done the vidcall to let Earthship II know they wanted to come onboard to talk about the virus, their communications manager—his female mate by his side—had asked if the two of them were mated.

After a moment of awkward confusion, Chandler had told a white lie. His mate was the doctor investigating the virus, and of course she would be coming aboard with him. The communications manager had shared a relieved smile with his wife, explaining that it was odd for them to see a man without his mate. It felt, to them, like an incomplete picture, like something was missing.

There was no way Rachel would sacrifice the information they could potentially acquire from the other ship over something as silly as this.

She turned away from her cupboard and planted her hands on her hips, staring at him. "You believe in marriage," she said flatly. "Doesn't this bother you?"

Bringing a hand up to his forehead, he rubbed his fingers over his brow, trying to stave off the frustrated headache that was building. His wife had been gone for years, and he'd been spending more and more time serving on the Nathan James ever since. He barely remembered what marriage even meant. "It's a necessary evil."

"You flatter me, Captain."

Closing his eyes, he drew in and exhaled a slow breath, before looking at her blankly. "If you insist on refusing, I will find someone else."

"No!" She glared at him, her jaw tightly set. "Don't you dare. I will do it. I won't like it, but I'll do it."

Honestly, that wasn't much better. "Rachel," he said gently. "You have to at least act like you're happy about it. If you can't do that, it's not even worth trying."

She turned her eyes to the wall, her lips pressed together, and he could see her mind working, see her slowly coming around as she worked through her issues with the plan. Finally, she sighed, and met his eyes again. "I understand. It was… a knee-jerk reaction. I apologize."

"Come here," he said, holding his arms out to her, and her eyes widened, all that tension returning to her body. "You're going to have to let me touch you. Consider this practice."

She looked away again, down and to the side, then closed her eyes and took a slow breath. With halting steps, she walked forward until she was close enough for him to wrap his arms around her shoulders, drawing her gently into his chest and holding her there. Her whole body was stiff, just standing there in his arms, and he kept one arm around her shoulders, their chests close together, and ran the other hand down her back, stroking down her spine until she started, just barely, to soften.

When she raised her arms, reaching tentatively around him, she shifted forward slightly, bringing the rest of their bodies in line as she turned her face against his shoulder, and suddenly there was a weight on his chest, a pit in his stomach, his mouth dry as the desert. He closed his eyes, his hand stopping at the small of her back, and cradled her body as she returned the embrace.

Then he inhaled sharply, setting her gently back, and with one hand on her waist and the other on her upper arm he met her eyes and said, "That wasn't so horrible, was it?"

She looked back at him, or at least the general vicinity of his face, and he could see the muscle in her jaw flex before she said, carefully measured, "No. I'm sure it will be fine."

They packed a small bag each and loaded into the two-man pod, Chandler piloting and Rachel sitting stiffly upright in the passenger seat. It was a two-hour pod trip from the Nathan James's mooring to the Earthship II, and Rachel spent the entirety of it with her gloves in her lap, rubbing at the unfamiliar weight of a wedding band on her left hand.

Chandler deftly maneuvered the pod into the open loading dock that was waiting for them, and when the door had closed behind them they climbed down to the deck. He circled the pod as quickly as he could, but still Rachel already had her feet on the deck by the time he got there. He gave her a look, taking her hand, and murmured, "Try to be less independent," just before the door to the ship opened and their welcoming party came through.

The communications manager and his wife were first to walk into the loading bay, followed by two more couples, an older man and woman and two middle-aged gentlemen.

"Welcome, welcome," the communications manager said. He'd introduced himself as Jacob earlier, and his wife as Elizabeth. Now he introduced them to Sarah and Jeffrey, the heads of the visitor welcoming committee, and Matthew and Christopher, who managed living unit assignments.

Sarah and Jeffrey stepped forward, and Sarah said brightly, "We haven't had visitors in—" She looked to her husband, then back to them. "Well, not since before we took these positions, which must be forty years now. You're most welcome." She held up her left hand, in which she held a long strip of cloth, and then lifted her right hand slightly, to demonstrate how a similar piece of cloth was tying her right hand to Jeffrey's left. "We would very much appreciate it if you would participate in a traditional binding of the hands. All married couples are bound this way, and it would help the others to find you less—well, strange."

Chandler looked nervously over at Rachel, who was staring at the binding with her face completely blank. He could only hope that a person who didn't know her wouldn't realize exactly how many emotions she was suppressing behind that mask.

Then she smiled, a superficial curving of her lips, and said, "Of course. We would be happy to."

It was a nice effort. Okay, it was… an effort. He held himself still, freezing his own facial expressions, and breathed slowly. Neither of them were born actors.

Tugging almost imperceptibly on her hand, he sought out her eyes, holding them for a moment before releasing her hand and shrugging out of his flight jacket, removing his gloves and stuffing them in the pocket. She did the same, handing him her jacket, and then they held out their hands, side-by-side, and Sarah bound them together.

It was a simple device, a knot at either end and holes along the length of the cloth, adjustable and easily removed, with a length of four or five inches between their wrists. "Of course," Sarah said, "you can remove the binding for hygiene routines, but most couples wear it the rest of the time. It _is_ optional."

It didn't feel optional, but they dropped their arms back to their sides and Chandler took her hand in his again. Rachel side-stepped a little closer to him and squeezed his hand, and then Jacob took the jackets from Chandler and moved to put them back in the pod as Sarah motioned for them to follow. She and Jeffrey, hands clasped, led them back through the inner door and into one of the main hallways, while Matthew and Christopher walked behind.

"These are the control rooms," Jeffrey said, gesturing to the doors on either side. "Down that hall are more loading bays of various size. I'm sure it's all very similar to home." He glanced over his shoulder, and Chandler nodded.

"All the Earthships were built from the same blueprint, of course," he said absently, waiting for Jeffrey to look away before he flexed his hand in Rachel's grip. She'd clamped down, even as she watched the doors pass by with a neutral expression, and she glanced back at him, chagrined.

"Sorry," she mouthed, and he smiled, shaking his head and adjusting to a more comfortable grip.

They were approaching a busier intersection, and Matthew spoke from behind them, saying, "The visitor's units are here, just south of the compass." _South_ and _compass_ were technically meaningless on the Earthships, but the maps used the words anyway as points of reference. He motioned to the first unit they passed. "You'll have VU1, and most everything's brand new. Like Sarah said—"

"Not too many visitors in space, right." Chandler was tempted to ask when they could talk about the virus, but he knew it would come across rude, and this whole thing would be a waste if they screwed it up before they got what they needed.

They'd estimated three days—both a best and worst case scenario, with what little knowledge they had of the other ship to work with. The Earthships shared data, of course, mostly children born, success of agriculture and so on, but for the most part they approached this mission as an introduction to an alien species. Be polite, but acknowledge that what is polite to you may be rude to them. Be _especially_ polite, in as neutral and kind a way as possible. Do not take risks. Accept all suggestions. Say yes. Make few declarative statements. It was exhausting.

The group of them paused at the corner just past the visitor's units, what was the south-west corner of the compass and the last quiet spot out of traffic. There was a large open square at the centre of the compass with numerous smaller hallways branching off of it. The square was a gathering place as well as a hub of activity, with couches (loveseats, really, as each seated two—for obvious reasons) arranged around coffee tables, and on the far side, a vendor of some sort for snacks and drinks. In the very centre of the square was a large signpost with arrows pointing toward each respective wing, with a more detailed map set into the floor. People were filling up the couches, heading up and down hallways, and generally bustling around making noise.

After giving them a moment to take it all in, Sarah said, "Why don't we show you one of our family units, and then perhaps Rachel would be interested in seeing the labs? That isn't on the standard tour, but again…"

"I would like that very much," Rachel said genuinely. "That is thoughtful, thank you."

Their little tour continued around the corner and down one of the residential hallways. "It's just luck," Matthew said, "that we have an empty unit today. A family with one child is adding another, so they've moved out of this unit and the next family hasn't moved in yet." They all stopped in front of a door marked 17E, and Matthew (and Christopher) stepped up to the scanner, only using his thumbprint. The doors, like their doors at home, were equipped with full biometric scanners, but that security could wait for the residents' arrival, if they decided to use it at all. The sort of crime that was deterred by a locked door was hard to commit on a ship like this.

Matthew and Christopher pushed the door open and followed it into the apartment, ushering the rest of them in as Christopher plucked a thin disc from its cradle on the wall and used it to manipulate the lighting in the unit. To the right was a small living area, which they walked through to access the bedrooms. Each room was only large enough for the necessities, and one wall of the living area formed the kitchenette. Meals would be taken in the dining hall, on schedule, although of course residents were welcome to keep snacks and drinks in their own family unit.

It wasn't so different from home—almost identical, really, except that Earthship V didn't call them _family units_ so much as _plural units_ , as in more than one person whether they were in a relationship or relatives or simply roommates. It wasn't hard to find a new arrangement if you'd tired of your current one, and that was the main difference between the ships, Chandler thought. One focused on longevity of relationships and the other focused on maximizing current contentment.

He didn't hold any illusions of his own morality, as if he were somehow superior for believing in marriage and monogamy when most of his peers didn't, but he did wonder, momentarily, what it would be like to live on a ship like this.

Back out in the hall Matthew and Christopher bade them farewell, asking Rachel and Tom to come find them in the living units management office when they were ready to have their biometrics scanned for their unit door. Sarah and Jeffrey led them further into the residential wing, glancing in on the hall lounge and then continuing past the housekeeping rooms to a service elevator that they rode down to the lowest floor.

As soon as they stepped off the elevator, Chandler could see a brightness return to Rachel that had been lacking since they'd arrived. Wide windows lined the halls, looking into different types of labs—Chandler had no idea what he was looking at, but he followed obediently along as Rachel stopped at each window and ooh-ed and ahh-ed at their equipment.

Sarah came up to Chandler's side, a step and a half behind Rachel as she'd dropped his hand and was using all of the extra length of their binding, and said quietly, "If you don't mind me asking, how did you two become mates? I mean, being in such different fields of work."

Right. He'd figured they wouldn't need a meet cute story, considering the lack of options on an Earthship, but it seemed that on Earthship II marriages were formed at least in part based on how compatible your work placements were. Considering you were almost never apart from your mate, it seemed you'd either have to work together or be extremely bored most of the time.

"Things are a little different on ship V," he said slowly, watching Rachel and knowing that she would be half-listening to whatever he said next. "We aren't bound together, and we do work in different fields. We met…" He paused, pretending fascination in whatever microscope they were just passing to give him a moment to think. "Yes, well, I had been married before, and my wife sadly passed several years ago. Our ship's doctor met Rachel at a sort of lecture series for medical doctors on the Earthship and he introduced us. He must have… ah… seen something… somehow known that we would fall in love. Which we did, almost instantly."

Rachel looked back, smiling at his poor concoction of a story, and shook her head, and he smiled back at her before turning to Sarah.

"I'm sorry," he said. "Is it customary on this ship to remarry after the death of a spouse? I hope I didn't offend."

She was looking somber, and Jeffrey held her bound hand in both of his, stroking one hand over the other. "I'm very sorry for your loss, Thomas," she said. "It _is_ customary to remarry when one is of reproducing age. As you both know, proliferation of the species remains our number one priority. I myself, in fact, was married once before, when I was very young. He passed as well."

"I'm so sorry," Chandler replied. "You have children…?"

"With Jeffrey, yes. They're grown now, with families of their own. We're very proud."

"And you, Thomas?" Jeffrey asked, and Rachel turned around altogether, coming back to clasp his hand and field that one.

"We're working on it," she said with a smile. "On our ship, my work was considered important enough to be my sole focus for longer than in most other cases. This is my first marriage, and quite late it may seem to you, with good reason. Now, we have the virus to contend with. But we're very much looking forward to starting our family, aren't we, dear?" Rachel looked up at him with a beatific smile, and he had to return her earlier head shake. What a story.

There was a little truth to what she'd said. Though monogamy wasn't a focus on their ship, reproduction was, and she'd been given a pass for many years, her research and medical work taking precedence. Even if medical school wasn't the same grind as it had once been on their home planet, it required quite a bit of attention, and doctors were essential. She had even been allowed to use birth control. Don't ask how Chandler knew that.

Once the virus was dealt with, well, she might be out of delays. Her biological clock was ticking—wow, Chandler really did know way too much about this woman. People talked, even on a regimented ship like the Nathan James, and he'd heard far more than he'd ever wanted to know.

Not that he'd thought about it. Certainly, he had no reason to think about Rachel's reproductive choices, or her feelings on marriage, or any of that. There was no fraternization on the ship—but he hadn't thought about it, so that was irrelevant. She was focused on her work, and he was focused on running his ship, and now they were pretending to be married to further both their causes, and that was all.

This thought process was getting him nowhere. "Have you seen enough, Rachel?"

"Umm," she hummed, staring through one window. "I don't suppose—you wouldn't be able to let me into one of the labs, would you?"

Sarah looked to Jeffrey, who said, "Not today, unfortunately. You have a meeting with some of our scientists scheduled for tomorrow afternoon, so you can ask them about it then."

"Wonderful," Rachel replied, turning back to the group. "Then I'm done. Thank you so much for allowing me a glimpse."

They walked to a different elevator and rode it back up to the main floor, where Sarah and Jeffrey led them to the dining hall. It took half the meal for Rachel and Tom to stop trying to use their bound hands and getting stymied, and even then they could only figure to leave those hands under the table and eat one-handed. Sarah and Jeffrey, and to look around, everyone else as well, seemed to be so finely tuned to their partner that they would have won any three-legged race held on their home planet.

Every time Rachel and Tom messed it up they shared a look, though they maintained their perfectly neutral expressions. It was a relief when at the end of the meal, Sarah told them that although she and Jeffrey would be enjoying a film in the Hall E lounge, Rachel and Tom were welcome to retreat to their unit and relax for the evening.

"Thank you," Rachel said, trading another look with Chandler. "It's been quite a long day."

Sarah and Jeffrey walked them back to the living units office and left them with Matthew and Christopher, who set up their biometric scanners and then watched as they used them for the first time, before letting the door fall shut behind them.

As soon as the latch clicked into place, Rachel fumbled for the binding, her fingers scrabbling over the fabric, too eager to focus long enough to actually make it work. Chandler laid his hand over hers and gently pulled it away, popping the knot through its hole with ease and freeing her. She walked into the living area as he released his own and hung the strip of fabric over the cradle for the light controls. When he followed her, she was pacing in circles in the small room, flexing and stretching her wrists and arms, shaking her hands out at her sides.

"Why would you want that?" she hissed when she saw him, flinging her hand in the direction of the hallway. "Why would anyone ever want that? How is their murder rate not sky high?"

He leaned against one side of the doorway, crossing his arms over his chest. "Are you saying you wanted to murder me?"

She stopped and looked at him for a second before rolling her eyes. "I mean, forty years? _Forty years!_ No. It's absurd. It's incredible. Someone is playing a joke on us."

"I guess they really love each other," he said mildly, and she waved her hand dismissively.

"Love doesn't make you superhuman."

"Sometimes it does."

She stared at him again, one of those looks she had that seemed to hold a hundred unspoken words, and when her lips parted, just slightly, he had to reach down and grip the door jamb in one hand, reminding himself not to—just not to. He knocked his head back against it, for good measure, and she sighed and walked over to the couch, flopping down on it.

"Would you do it? Forty years?"

"I don't know," he said gruffly, picking their bags up from the floor by the door and carrying them over to the couch. Handing her hers, he sat down at the other end of the couch—loveseat, only inches between them—and pulled his tablet out of the front pocket of his bag. "It's hard to say I wouldn't, considering." When you commit your life to someone and you're just getting started on that life when you lose them… all you want is more time. Bound together? Sure. Forty years? Love to. (He couldn't say that out loud.)

She had her own tablet on her lap, but was watching him instead. He glanced back at her, and she looked down, powering up her tablet, so he did the same. After sending an update to the officers on his ship, Chandler opened the book he was in the middle of and read while Rachel sat hunched over the same files she must have gone over a hundred times.

When the clock on his tablet ticked over to 2200, he stood up from the couch and took his bag into the bathroom, changing into his sleep clothes and going into the bedroom to do crunches on the floor beside the bed. Rachel wandered in a little while later, dressed in a tank top and sleep shorts, and Chandler looked away the second he'd processed what he was seeing. He couldn't expect her to sleep in full coverage, but… that was a lot.

He stayed flat on the floor, eyes closed, until she'd climbed into bed, and then he went to the closet to grab an extra pillow and blanket, dropping them on the floor.

"Oh, please don't."

Jaw tight, he turned to face her, one hand clenched into a fist behind his back. She was sitting up with the blanket over her lap, giving him a look, and he raised his eyebrows at her.

"I won't have you sleeping on the floor. We're married, aren't we?"

He shook his head, and she dropped her hands onto the covers, palms up.

"We are _adults_."

Okay, _and_ the bed was barely a double, made for extremely monogamous married couples who walked around all day with their hands bound together. Even if he was technically single, sleeping in a tiny bed with… well, to be specific, with _her_ , felt a little too intimate.

She was watching him stare down the bed, her face growing increasingly incredulous. " _Really?_ " she said, and he shut his eyes again, taking a slow breath before sitting down on the edge of the bed.

"If you insist," he said, and he heard the wry smile in her voice when she replied, "I insist." By the time he dared to glance over his shoulder, she was lying on her side with her back to him and the blanket drawn up to her shoulder. He turned to sit at the head of the bed, pulling the blanket up over his legs, and stared at the space between the lump that was his legs and the lump that was Rachel's body. A matter of inches. Not enough.

"Would you relax?" she said, and he jumped a little, shaking the bed. She pushed up on her elbow, looking over her shoulder at him, and he said, "Yeah. Sure." She sat up the rest of the way and then turned, kneeling beside him and putting one hand on his shoulder. She was staring at his face as he was staring straight ahead at the opposite wall, and then she raised her other hand to his cheek, turning his face toward her.

He squeezed his eyes shut, hoping that if he didn't move nothing would happen, but she whispered, "This was your idea," and kissed him.

His arm snaked around her waist, tugging her in tight to his side, while his other hand went up to her face and cupped her jaw as he kissed her fiercely, starving for her touch. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled herself onto his lap, kneeling over him and locking her elbows behind his head.

He kept telling himself he would stop it after one more second, one more touch, and then she settled herself in his lap and reached for the hem of his shirt and he said, "Wait."

She stopped there, tilting her head with a quizzical expression, and his heart pounding in his throat threatened to choke him.

"I'm sorry," he said. "Rachel, I can't."

She froze, blinking at him, her expression falling in increments, and then she scrambled off his lap and back to the other side of the bed. "Oh my god," she said, her hands covering her face, and she sat at the edge of the bed with her knees pulled up to her chest, wrapping her arms around her head and pressing her face to her knees. "Oh my god."

"Rachel—"

"Please don't," she said. "Please go away."

"Rachel, you don't understand."

"I don't _want_ to understand," she said, getting off the bed and walking out of the room. She did a lap of the living area, one hand covering her face, and then walked into the bathroom and shut the door.

Getting up from the bed feeling like Atlas with a planet to uphold, Chandler walked over to the bathroom door and sat at its base, leaning his head back against the surface. "Rachel, I'm sorry."

"I don't want an apology!"

"Would you listen to me for one second?" Silence. "It's my responsibility to… be the strong one, to maintain distance. To lead this goddamn mission. To not get distracted. It's what I signed up for when I agreed to captain the Nathan James. And it's what I've been fighting to do ever since you came on board. Please don't think it's been _easy_ just because I don't show you how hard it is."

When her voice sounded again, it was just on the other side of the door. "I'm humiliated."

"Please, please don't be. If I could… if I didn't have the responsibility… Rachel, if I was free to say yes to you, I would never say no. You have to know that."

"I don't care," she said weakly. "I couldn't care less."

"Okay," he said reassuringly. "Of course. But if you did care, I would want you to know that once this is all over, once we're back home… well, I won't have any more reason to say no."

There was a moment of silence, longer than he'd have liked, and then the door clicked open behind him. He looked up and back, seeing Rachel half-hidden by the door and looking very small.

"We should sleep," she said, and he pushed himself to his feet, reaching a hand out to her. She stepped forward, past his hand, and crossed to the bed, sitting down on its edge again. He walked back over to the pillow and blanket he'd left on the floor, and she said softly, "Please don't."

He looked over and she looked away, to the wall across from the bed. "I—" he started. "Are you—"

"I mean," she said, leaning on her hands and looking down at the floor, "do what you like. If it's too hard, of course. Or we could… just sleep."

"Okay," he said softly, stepping over to the bed. "We can sleep." She curled up on her side again, and he lay down beside her, and she shifted back into him. He closed his eyes, curving his body around her, his knuckles pressed to her belly as her spine pressed to his chest, and he would be lying if he said it was easy. He would be lying if he said he wasn't doubting himself already, because he wasn't at all sure that this was less intimate than sex.

He wasn't at all sure that hadn't just avoided making one mistake by making one that could be much worse. Not that it felt _wrong_. It felt—like something he shouldn't think too much about. He could just sleep, right? He was capable of that?

With her body pressed to his, his face pressed to her hair, her belly rising and falling under his hand, he could sleep. But he was afraid the line he'd been toeing was now far in the rear distance.


	2. Chapter 2

_Never thought I'd find it, what I was looking for;  
such a simple solace in someone I adore.  
I can be a leader, and I will lead us home;  
we will live in colour and never be alone._

They were woken at 0700 by a soothing woman's voice floating through the entire ship, saying, "Good morning, citizens. Please prepare for your scheduled breakfast period."

It made Chandler jump a little and draw his arms closer to his chest in reflex. Of course, Rachel was in between his arms and his chest, so he started his day by squeezing her tightly. If his hands were free he would smash his face into them, but objectively it was an incredibly pleasant way to start a day.

"Sorry," he said gruffly, releasing her, and she rolled over to face him, sliding back toward the edge of the bed to keep some space between them.

"Good morning," she said, a bit nervously. "We have a lot of ground to cover today, if all goes to plan. The plan, which…" She eyed him carefully. "…remains the same as it was yesterday?"

"Of course," he said, suddenly feeling equally nervous as he sat up and swung his legs down to the floor. "If you're willing to be tied to a jackass for twelve-ish hours."

"For the mission," Rachel said seriously, watching him from where she'd sat up in the bed.

"For the mission," he agreed, heading to the bathroom. In the doorway, he stopped short and turned around. "I'm just gonna be a second. You can have the shower first." She gave him a funny look, but as long as it had been since he was married, he knew: you always gave the woman the shower first.

Just before 0800, they stopped in the front hallway and Chandler picked up the binding from where he'd left it. He held it up and met Rachel's eyes. "Are you sure you want to continue?"

She just held out her wrist in answer, and he wrapped the cloth around it, slipping the knot through its hole and letting his thumb graze over the delicate skin on the inside of her wrist before he let go and did his own.

When they stepped out into the hall, Sarah and Jeffrey were waiting for them, as chipper as ever. Chandler took Rachel's hand as they walked back to the dining hall, and after breakfast Sarah and Jeffrey led them around the personal development wing, showing them the library and exercise facilities, and allowing them to peek inside some of the classrooms.

Then they had a half hour before lunch, so they let Rachel loose in the library. She walked around like a bloodhound, leading with her nose, and Chandler trailed behind as she ran her fingers along the spines of books. He wasn't sure whether she lit up more here or down in the labs, but either way he watched her pleasure and clutched her hand, content to be ignored.

After lunch, a pair of scientists met them outside the dining hall and took them off Sarah and Jeffrey's hands. It was a man and woman, wearing lab coats and bound at the wrist, although the woman confided in Rachel that they removed their bindings in the lab.

"That's a relief," Rachel replied. "No disrespect to my husband, but he's, um—"

"A dead weight?" Chandler interjected, and Rachel slid him a sideways smile.

"Oh yes," the woman—her name was Rebecca, and her husband was Luke—said. "Sarah mentioned that you two don't work in the same field. That must be…" She shared a look with her husband. "…interesting?"

Rachel laughed, a real laugh that hit Chandler in the gut. He wasn't sure he'd ever heard her laugh before. It wasn't melodic, musical, the way romance novels always described that first laugh (not that he had ever read a romance novel in his life… or so he would tell anyone who asked) but raspy, from deep in her throat, and sexier than it had any right to be.

They took an elevator down again, and Rebecca and Luke led them to one of the labs, unlocking the door with the biometric scanners and ushering Tom and Rachel into a room that looked something like Rachel's lab on the ship. Rebecca and Luke removed their binding, hanging it on a hook by the door, and Rachel held her wrist out to Tom, smiling at him. When they were free, Rachel followed Rebecca over to a microscope and Chandler started wandering the room, keeping his hands to himself and just looking around. He had no idea what he was looking at, but Rachel wouldn't even let him _into_ her lab, so he enjoyed the chance to snoop.

He didn't bother paying attention as Rachel and the other scientists looked through lenses and studied computer screens and nattered away in science-ese. He did, eventually, sit down on a stool that didn't appear to be close to anything important. He did, then, watch Rachel work, because he had nothing else to do. She was engrossed, although Rebecca at one point nudged her and pointed over to Chandler, at which point Rachel met his eyes and smiled.

He could have sworn the world slowed down then, as he watched Rebecca's lips form the words, "You haven't been married long, he looks lovesick." Rachel looked over again, her eyes widening, and he cringed, looking down at the blank counter in front of him. Probably, Rebecca had been extrapolating, saying something nice just to say it. The fact that it was true didn't _help_ , but it also didn't mean Rachel would believe it.

A while later, Rachel called his name and they all gathered inside the door again to replace their bindings. He didn't want to take her hand— _maybe if I act like nothing is going on nothing will be going on_ —but he knew it would be suspicious if he didn't, so he did.

As they walked back down the hall, he asked, "Did you get everything you needed?"

"Mm," was all he got in response, and he realized Rachel was holding herself tensely, her eyes on the other scientists. He thought it was about him, at first, and was trying to think of something to say when they passed a hallway branching off the one they were in and Rachel darted down it, pulling him with her.

 _What_ , he didn't say, keeping his mouth shut and following her lead as she pressed her body to the wall and peeked around the corner. When the hall was clear, she headed back the other way, walking as fast as her legs could carry her, and it was all he could do to keep up. At the door to the lab they'd just left, she pressed her fingertips to the centre of the panel and he was surprised to see it swing open. She bent down, picking something up off the floor, and he realized she'd blocked the latch as they'd left. How had she done that without him noticing?

She rushed into the room, letting the door fall shut behind them, and tore the binding off her hand before sprinting to the computer and pulling her personal comm out of her pants pocket. She took several pictures with the built-in camera, then spoke into it as she scrolled through some files.

Chandler was still standing frozen just inside the door, trying to figure out what was going on, when he heard voices in the hallway and said, " _Rachel_ ," jerking his head back toward the hall. She tapped on the computer screen a few more times until the files she'd opened were closed, slipped her comm back into its pocket, then crossed back to him in a few long strides, letting her momentum carry her crashing into his chest and slamming him back into the wall beside the door.

Before he could regroup, she was reaching up and tugging him down, fusing their mouths together as she pressed the entire length of her body against him and the door clicked open beside them.

"Oh my goodness."

The voice was only inches away but sounded incredibly distant as his hands at the small of her back pressed her body even closer, her shirt sliding up with the heels of his hands as his fingers spread across her skin.

"Excuse me," the voice spoke again, and Rachel let him go, stepping back and covering her mouth with one hand. Rebecca and Luke were standing in the open doorway, staring, and Chandler side-stepped around to the other side of Rachel, one hand going up to rub at the back of his neck.

He stared at the floor, feeling his face heat up— _oh god, I'm blushing, how embarrassing_ —and then Rebecca started laughing and Luke joined in.

"Newlyweds!" Rebecca said jokingly, and when Chandler glanced at Rachel, she was smiling back at the other woman ruefully.

"Sorry. What you said earlier, just… um."

"Not to worry," Rebecca replied, ushering them back out into the hall. "I understand." They started back down the hall to the elevator, Rachel hurriedly reattaching her end of the binding cloth, and Rebecca went on, "I remember those days. Vaguely, but I do remember them. That look in your husband's eyes… well, if you could resist it, what's the point of being married, right?"

Chandler kind of wanted to sink into the floor as Rachel wrapped her hand around his again and squeezed. She laid her other hand on his forearm, rubbing it up and down reassuringly as she said, "Right. Thank you for understanding."

Back upstairs, Rebecca and Luke joined them for dinner. Once they were seated, Rachel took Tom's bound hand and set it on her leg, laying her own hand on top and stroking it over his skin. The three of them seemed to be having a pleasant conversation, but Tom could only stare at his plate and think about how miserably in love he was. So much for staying in control. So much for being the strong one. He was useless.

Once again, their guides left them to return to their unit after dinner, and once again, Rachel scrabbled to remove the binding as quickly as she possibly could once the door closed behind them. Chandler only made it one step past the door, remaining there as Rachel hung the binding cloth from the cradle on the wall and took a few steps down the hall.

She turned back, when he didn't move, and stared at him. "I'm sorry," she said, "about earlier."

"It's okay," he said, waving a hand dismissively but not looking up.

"Are _you_ okay?"

He nodded— _liar_ —and said, "I'm wondering." He paused. "If you… if you knew you could have one night with someone, but only one night, and then… nothing. If you could only have one night, would you?"

"That's not much of a hypothetical."

He shrugged one shoulder. "Would you?"

"Yes." She took a step closer. "If, in another hypothetical, someone had already told me there was a future for us, however distant, then yes. I would."

He almost smiled at that—she was too smart for him, she would always outsmart him, and that was just as it should be. With the ghost of a hope on his face, he finally looked up to see her watching him carefully, and when he said, "I think I made a mistake," she tilted her head, her eyebrows drawing together. He waved his left hand at the wall: "Yesterday."

She started to smile, but her eyes narrowed at the same time. "That was not a good time for a mistake."

"I know." He started walking forward, slow measured steps. "I feel pretty terrible about it."

She could just reach him now, her fingers plucking at the hem of his shirt, curling around it as he took another step forward, and she said, "No more of that," before taking her own step forward and reaching up with one hand, leaving the other curled in the fabric of his shirt as she slid her hand around the back of his neck and drew him down, pushing up to meet him halfway and kiss him.

He wrapped his arms around her waist, hungry as ever for her touch, and bent his knees and lifted so that she could wrap her legs around his waist. Turning toward the wall, he backed her up against it, holding one hand out to take the brunt of the collision and then pressing her back to the wall and sliding his hands down to grip the underside of her thighs.

She shifted, her shoulders leverage as she tilted her hips and readjusted her legs, moaning into his mouth as she managed to make contact, and then his fingers were sliding up her thighs and reaching for the heat he could feel even through her pants and she made another sound, deep in her throat and somehow desperate.

He moved his hands back to safety, breaking the kiss and saying breathlessly, "Rachel." She darted immediately for his neck, sucking at a spot just inside his collarbone, and he groaned, one hand going up to her shoulder and pressing her back against the wall even as she looked up at him with hazy eyes and pouted. "Rachel, are you sure—"

"Yes." She nodded stoutly, and he had to fight a smile.

"I mean, are you sure that you can go back… back to the ship and back to the way things were?"

"The mission comes first," she said by rote, staring at his mouth.

"I'm going to put you down if you can't focus."

She smiled at his mouth, then frowned up at his eyes, and he had to grin before schooling his face into a serious expression. "I want this mission to succeed as much as you do," she said, "if not more. It's my name on the line if I can't cure this virus. Don't doubt my commitment."

"Whoa," he said back. "I was thinking more like, if my life is threatened… again. I need to know that what happened with Kara and Danny won't happen with us."

She thought about that, nodding a little. "I will probably shout at you, but I have a history of shouting at you, so." She shrugged. "What about you? You have a lot more sway."

"Yeah, I thought about that," he said, "but I have a history of… saving you. So."

"See," she said, looking back down at his mouth, "that's sexy."

 _Oh my god_ , he thought, the hand on her shoulder going up to cup her jaw as he leaned in to kiss her again, leaned into the cradle of her hips and swallowed her whimper, then dropped his hand to slide it between her spine and the wall, one arm locking around her back while his other hand still had a firm grip on her thigh. He turned them away from the wall, and she wrapped her arms tight around his neck as he kissed her with eyes open, taking careful steps down the hall and through into the bedroom.

He turned again, backing up to the bed until he felt the mattress against his legs and then sitting down, and they both groaned as Rachel settled in his lap, breaking the kiss to lean her forehead against his cheek as she let her legs unlock, her feet dropping to the bed and her hips automatically rocking against him. She muffled her whimper, wrapping her arms around his shoulders and pressing their chests together as she rocked again, and again, and Chandler had to stop her before they both came fully clothed.

Slipping his hands under her shirt, he held her waist briefly to still her, then pushed her shirt up and over her head. Turning to lay her down on the bed, he stopped to kiss her deeply, and when he pulled away to stand she pouted again, her brow wrinkling. He pulled his shirt off, unbuckled his pants and got them off as fast as humanly possible, and then he leaned over to kiss her stomach, his hands at the waistband of her pants as he said, "Don't be sad."

"Hurry up," she said back, her voice straining, and he tugged her pants off, climbing back onto the bed and sinking inside her. She'd squeezed her eyes shut, her hands gripping at the muscles on his shoulders, and he waited until her chest rose and fell with a captured breath before he started to move. She swept her hands over his shoulders and up to the back of his head, pulling him down to kiss her as her body moved in response to his.

He built a slow rhythm, focused on her reactions, her gasping breaths and the way her fingernails scratched through his hair, drawing a groan out of him. When she arched against him, trails of rapidly evaporating sweat tracing between her breasts and down over her belly, he slowed down further and she gasped for real, her eyes opening as she gripped the back of his head and said forcefully, " _Tom_."

He could have teased her, made her say it out loud, but that was actually some pretty direct and clear communication from Dr. Rachel Scott, so he listened and picked up his rhythm until she reached her peak and fell, with him following soon after.

Holding himself up on one arm, he reached around with the other for the blanket, pulling it up and over Rachel's body before drawing himself out of her and rolling to the side. She took the blanket gratefully, pulling it up over her shoulder as she rolled to face him, and still she began to shiver as the sweat evaporated and her body cooled down. He reached out and tugged her into his chest, blanket and all, and she tucked her head under his chin, sighing.

"You're a furnace," she said, and he smiled.

"You're just very small."

"I am _not_. I am above average height for a woman, a normal weight, and you would be surprised how much of that is muscle."

"I think I can say I'm at least relatively familiar with your body at this point. You're still small."

"To a giant," she muttered into the blanket even as she snuggled closer and he wrapped his arms tighter around her. They stayed like that and dozed off a little until Rachel woke with a start and jerked against him.

The lights were all still on and he wasn't sure if he'd actually fallen asleep, but he put a little space between them, one hand on her upper arm and the other going up to her cheek as he looked at her. "You okay?"

She looked startled, confused, and annoyed, and it took her a second to respond. "I need… to write a report."

Thoughts flashed through his mind— _a sex report?_ and _right now, really?_ and _oh right, some shit went down today_ —and what he ended up saying was, "Oh. I just realized I never asked you what the hell happened in that lab, and, um, I'm kind of ashamed of myself."

A brief smile stole across her face, and she tapped her index finger on his chin. "This is what happens when you ignore your baser urges. They eat your brain from the inside out."

"Science!" he replied, and she grinned before turning grim.

"Actually, this is a good example of why we need to be on-mission as soon as we leave this ship. Rebecca and Luke showed me the composition of the virus and the formula for the cure, but it's what they didn't show me that made me go back. When the files were sorted by date, the virus and the cure were bookended by two memos.

"The first was addressed to the captain of this ship, from a doctor we didn't meet, chief of something-or-other. I have the details on my comm, but the memo outlined the dosing of raw meat that was to be shipped frozen to the other Earthships within range, a supposed surplus. The second memo was from this captain to the captains of the other Earthships… a gracious note about their donation of the surplus meat.

"Also, the cure formula they showed me was incomplete. I'm not sure what the long-game is here, but it definitely isn't for us to return with a successful cure."

"Jesus," Chandler breathed. "So… either they want to destroy the other populations, or… what, come out the heroes with the cure?"

"I don't know." Still wrapped in the blanket and Chandler's arms, Rachel leaned her forehead against his chest with a long sigh. "Whatever it is, it's not good." She sat up, looking around for her tablet, then walked into the living area, wearing the blanket as a toga. Coming back with tablet and comm in hand, she climbed onto the bed and set a pillow up at the head so she could sit up and work.

"Can I do anything?" Chandler asked; she was already engrossed and tapping away at the screen.

"I could use a drink of water, babe." She looked up, staring across the room at the wall, eyes narrowed. "Let's strike that from the record. That didn't happen. Just a water."

He leaned over, kissed the top of her head, and said mildly, "Okay, sweetie-pie."

She just shook her head, purposefully ignoring him, and got to work. Chandler put his pants back on and headed out into the living area to grab his own tablet, then over to the kitchenette to find bottles of water in the mini fridge and bags of snacks laid out on the counter. He grabbed two bottles of water and a bag of peanuts and went back to the bed, setting his own pillow up so he could sit next to her and read his book. Handing her one of the waters, he opened the bag of peanuts and left it between them on the bed.

A while later—all the peanuts, and most of his water—she leaned her head back against the wall and closed her eyes, sighing.

"All done?" he asked, taking her tablet from her lap and setting it with his on the bedside table. She reached up to rub at her neck, craning it in the opposite direction, and Chandler crossed his legs, tugging gently on her arm until she moved to sit in front of him so he could massage her shoulders. She sighed again, dropping her head forward, and he only managed to go over them once before she was leaning all the way back against his chest.

He wrapped his arms around her waist, tugging her back into his lap, and she said, "I don't want to get used to this."

"I know," he murmured, their cheeks brushing as he bent his head to kiss the place where her collar bone met her shoulder. "I'm sorry." They sat in silence for a minute, her hands over his where they rested on her belly, and then he said, "You tired?"

"Kind of wired, actually. How about you?"

He smiled into the curve of her neck, kissed her skin again, and said, "I'm up if you're up."

"Up?" she said back, planting one hand on his knee as she wriggled in his lap. "You up?"

"Oh my god," he laughed. "Yeah, you keep doing that, I'll be up."

She reached back, instead, her palm landing flat on his stomach before slipping under his waistband and wrapping around him. She shifted forward, onto her knees, and turned around to face him, her grip adjusting but not releasing, and he groaned as she stroked his length and stretched up to kiss him. He didn't even have time to uncross his legs before she was pulling him out of his sweatpants and climbing back on top of him, pushing him back onto the bed as she guided him inside of her and settled on his hips.

She stayed there for a second, her head hanging forward and her hair dangling low enough to trace maddening lines on the skin of his abdomen, and he reached a hand up to her cheek, his fingers pushing through her hair and around the back of her neck, and she met his eyes, smiling wickedly before she started to rock her hips. His other hand slid from her knee to her hip and up to her waist, before running back down, his fingers spread as he massaged and memorized the muscles flexing as she rode him. Her body was incredible, and he didn't need her to tell him how surprisingly muscular it was.

When they were finished, she wrapped up in the blanket again and then in his arms. He had to fly them back again the next day, and they would need to get some sleep, but it was hard to shut off his brain, shut off the part of him that was trying to burn this feeling into his memory. He hated that he'd have to let her go, when just holding her like this was all he'd ever wanted.

He wasn't sure he wouldn't choose her, if he had the choice. He wasn't sure whether he was glad or furious that he _didn't_ have it, had no choice but to carry on with the mission, because there was nowhere else to go.

She had long relaxed in his arms, her breaths slow and steady, when he whispered her name to see if she was awake. She didn't respond, and he whispered as soft as he could, "I love you. I'm sorry, I just had to say it."

xxx

The announcement woke them at 0700, and they met inside the door just before 0800. Rachel held up her wrist, her eyes intent on his face, and he took her hand in his and brought the inside of her wrist to his lips, closing his eyes and kissing the tender skin. He tugged her forward, meeting her eyes, and kissed her properly for the last time, one hand cupping her cheek and the other at the small of her back. She wrapped her arms around his neck, the kiss a study in muted longing, and then she dropped to her heels and held up her wrist again, and he bound it.

Sarah and Jeffrey were waiting outside their door with bright cheery smiles to lead them to breakfast. Rachel clutched Chandler's hand, and when Sarah said, "I hope you got the information you needed!" with absolutely no discernible hidden intent, Rachel tensed and replied, "Yes, we got plenty, thank you." There would have to be a proper meeting when they got back to the Nathan James, but for now their focus was on completing their 'visit' and making it back in one piece.

They shared a pleasant breakfast, and then Sarah and Jeffrey walked them back to the landing bay where they'd left their pod. Sarah hugged them both, holding onto Rachel a bit longer as she said something into Rachel's ear, and then Sarah unbound their wrists with a serious expression.

"Thank you, again," she said, "for participating in our tradition. Will you keep the cloth, as a memento?"

Rachel smiled, her hands clasped in front of her now that they were free, and said, "Of course." She accepted the gift, tucking it away in her pack, and then they donned their flight jackets and helmets and climbed back into the pod, waving and smiling their goodbyes.

While Chandler powered up the pod and checked settings he asked, "What did Sarah say to you?"

Rachel buckled her safety belt and sat back in her seat, closing her eyes. "She wished me success. Specifically, in my childbearing endeavours."

"Oh," he replied, and they didn't speak again for the two hours of flight time.

Chandler's officers, Doc Rios, and a few other key thinkers were gathered in the ward room when they arrived, with some of the Earthship V council patched in via vidcomm. Rachel delivered her report, to a response of mostly bewilderment and shock. No one could understand how the citizens of Earthship II could turn on their own people, for weren't they all still people of Earth?

"A siege?" Slattery asked Chandler, but Rachel replied.

"The citizens are innocent, I'm almost certain of it. Even the scientists who helped me, I can't—I don't believe they were involved. The captain, this doctor, whoever they have working with them, they are a minority on the ship."

Chandler let her speak, meeting her eyes when she sought his, and then he said, "This is a situation in need of finesse. If we want to salvage our relationship with the ship—" He met her eyes again, questioning; he wasn't sure that was the right thing to do at all, but she nodded. "—we will have to take out the ones to blame, and no one else."

Rachel and the Doc left the room at that point, to see if they could find any answers in the science while Chandler and his men discussed strategy. In the end, they decided on a Trojan horse—Chandler and Rachel would pay another visit in a larger ship, bringing gifts in return for the hospitality they'd been shown. Those gifts, of course, would be sailors armed to the teeth who would move through the ship to the captain's quarters with stealth. He would point them to those who assisted him, they would all be imprisoned, bing bang boom.

That was how Chandler explained it to Rachel, anyway, insisting that she didn't need to actually be aboard the ship for the plan to work. She argued—after all, they would need to find the complete cure, and his men couldn't be trusted to know where to look or what to look for, but Chandler promised they wouldn't return without it and she relented.

He promised, looking into her eyes, and she looked back with her eyes soft and sad around the edges and said, _Okay. I trust you._

It all went more or less to plan, so he would tell Rachel and the rest of the ship. The captain was a fool, the doctor mad with power, neither of them prepared for an ambush in their own quarters. They wanted to wrest control from the other ships, come out on top and lead all the Earthships as one—and they would have succeeded if it weren't for you and your little blah blah.

Chandler described it to Rachel like a scene from one of the ancient Earth movies, changing his voice and gesturing broadly as he sat on the edge of her bunk, and she just leaned back against the wall and watched him, more amused than he'd ever seen her. They'd brought back the doctor's personal computer with all the files Rachel could ever need, so she was predisposed to appreciation.

She spent the trip back to Earthship V in her lab, perfecting the formulation of the cure and then producing hundreds of doses, and they moored just off the ship until she had enough for everyone. Chandler had brought Rebecca and Luke to assist her, but the lab on the Nathan James was small and cramped and even as fast as they could work, they knew people were dying on the Earthship.

The sailors spent the days running drills and bickering, and Chandler spent his days napping between meal times, bringing Rachel food and watching as she ate it, taking her out of the lab when it was time to sleep and sitting beside her bed as she did it. He knew she would work herself to death, otherwise, and he couldn't afford to care what anyone else thought about it.

He didn't touch her, didn't hold her; watched, and coaxed, as the only person on the ship she would listen to. He didn't think about that— _liar_ —as he sat beside her bed at night, didn't wonder whether her feelings went as deep as his— _liar_ —didn't have a bud of hope growing a tiny bit every time he asked something of her and she looked at him with tired eyes and complied.

After all, it was for the mission.


	3. Chapter 3

_I think I know every freckle on your face;  
your smell is so familiar, I always know the trace.  
You are breaking barriers I thought would always stay;  
I am gripped with fear, though, at the thought of time I waste._

When they were finally able to dock, immediately setting up stations from which to administer the cure as Rachel had shown them on the ship, he looked for her anxiously. Before he could do anything else, when they'd hardly set their feet on the desk, he looked for her, and she was already gone. He found Doc Rios, instead, and the man patted Chandler reassuringly on the shoulder.

"She's taking doses to the geriatric ward," the doctor said. "She wanted to be sure they got them first." When Chandler looked desperately off in that direction, Rios patted his arm again. "Go help her," he said, and Chandler took off.

By the time he reached the ward, the case of doses was sitting empty on the counter of the nurses station, the nurses spread across the rooms as they gently delivered the shots to elderly souls, most suffering from dementia and shrinking from the sight of a needle. Chandler asked the first nurse he came to where Rachel was, and she looked at him with interest as she pointed down the hall. "Room 14."

In the doorway, he stopped short. Rachel was sitting in a chair next to a wheelchair, the empty syringe discarded on the tray as she stroked the arm of an old man, her hand curled around his bony fingers and her eyes locked on his face. She glanced up at Chandler as soon as he appeared, then looked back to the old man and lifted a hand to stroke his face, saying something in a low tone before standing up from her chair and walking past Chandler out into the hall. He followed behind as she walked toward the exit, stopping to speak with one of the nurses and then heading back toward the loading bays.

Chandler had to jog a little to keep up, Rachel taking long strides with her face set, and he turned to walk backwards in front of her, holding out a hand and saying, "Hey. You okay?"

"Yes," she said, staring straight ahead, and he stopped, his arm still held out in front of her so that she had to stop walking as well to avoid making contact. She looked at his arm, then at his face, her eyebrows raised, and he raised his in return, smiling and drawing a smile out of her despite her mood. She glanced around, taking a few steps down a smaller side corridor and leaning against the wall, and he stepped up to lean against the wall facing her, six inches between them.

"My father," she said, gesturing back the way they came.

He tilted his head, looking for affection in her face, for love, and finding only a flat expression that she avoided pointing in his direction. "I'm sorry," he said, and she shrugged the shoulder that wasn't pressed to the wall.

"If he had his wits, he wouldn't allow me to treat him, so I suppose it's better this way."

"What do you mean?"

She glanced at his face, briefly stricken, and then looked away with the same blank mask. "My father… didn't believe in medicine. He was a man of God—" Her voice broadened with the words. "—and only God decides who lives and dies. So my mother died." She said it plainly, still emotionless, and then a bitter smile twisted her lips as she went on, "Now I decide, and God can judge us both in the end."

Chandler took a sliding step forward, his shoulder to the wall, and closed the space between them, his outside arm going around her waist and pulling her forward into his chest. He turned his back to the wall and wrapped his other arm around her as she laid her cheek on his chest, her hands resting on either side of his waist. She sighed, softening almost instantly, and he thought that might have been progress.

"They don't need us back there," he said quietly.

"They'll look for us."

"I don't care. I'll text Rios. Come back to my unit with me."

She stayed where she was, silent, before saying, "You meant what you said."

"Did you doubt me?"

Leaning back to look at him, she reached up to touch his cheek and smiled. "No. Maybe. I—I'm used to being disappointed."

"Rachel…" He closed his eyes, tipping his head back against the wall and saying, "Can I be entirely honest with you?"

When he looked down again her smile was gone, her lips slightly parted and her brow furrowed as she stared at his chin. "I thought you were being."

"I haven't lied to you," he said, "but I could be more truthful. Will you let me?"

Her eyes flicked up to meet his and danced away, never holding his gaze for more than a second but she nodded and he knew he had her full attention.

He still had his arms wrapped around her, and he stared down at her even as she tried to avoid the intensity of it. "Rachel," he said again, his stomach doing flips, and then forced out in a rush, "I'm in love with you. If you thought I might have changed my mind, you can't know that, because I—" He pushed off the wall, curving forward around her and pressing his face to her hair, his lips to her ear, breathing out, "I've been counting on this."

She slid her hands up his back, curving with him, and turned her face toward his, seeking out his mouth with hers. He met the kiss and sighed through his nose, straightening up enough that she wasn't bent backwards and lifting a hand to her face, the other arm holding her body pressed close to his. He poured it all into the kiss, the waiting and the love and the knowing, just knowing and loving her so deeply, and when he pulled away—after the lingering and the butterfly kisses and sharing each other's breath—when he actually managed to look at her face, her eyes were shut and her lips parted and her breathing slow and steady, and when she blinked her eyes open a moment later, she held his gaze solidly.

Then she tilted her head back, one hand holding onto his neck, and grinned at the ceiling. He clasped his hands at the small of her back, supporting her as she leaned back and turned that grin on him, so he had no choice but to return it.

"We should go back to your unit," she said, and he laughed out of pure relief and happiness, standing up from the wall and wrapping one hand around hers as they walked back out into the main hallway. They didn't pass directly by the loading bays, but Rachel saw the people gathered and drifted in that direction before Chandler tugged on her hand and kept her on track.

He handed her his comm, which was open to his conversation with Doc Rios.

 **Chandler:** _Rachel's exhausted, y'all good for now?_

 **Rios:** _We're good. In fact, she's banned from cure distribution. Make her get some sleep, please._

 **Chandler:** _Aye aye._

She laughed, handing it back and wrapping that hand around his forearm, walking with him to his unit. She did a walk-through, as much of a tour as you could do in what was essentially identical to the visitors' unit they'd stayed in on the other ship, but with his tiny personal touches, photographs that she peered at closely, a ceramic dish holding his wife's wedding ring and his own, a framed print of an anchor. He trailed her as she did one nosy loop of the space, hanging onto her hand, and they ended up at the bed.

He nudged her back, the bed hitting her at the knee and forcing her to sit, and then he pulled the blanket out and ushered her under it.

She frowned, even as she moved easily at the touch of his hands, laying her head on the pillow and drawing the blanket up when he draped it over her. "I don't need to sleep," she said, without the obstinacy he expected, as if she really didn't feel completely exhausted, but he saw it in her eyes and the shadows under them and the slight lag in all her movements.

He frowned back, the same innocence in his voice when he said, "Well, I'm tired. You can—" He waved his hand vaguely. "—use my tablet or something if you don't want to cuddle."

Turning her face against the pillow as if that would hide the smile curling up her lips, she said, "Well, you didn't say anything about _cuddling_."

He smiled back and went into the bathroom to wash up and came back to find her fast asleep, looking all the more wan and in need of it. He crawled into bed beside her, tugging her toward the centre of the bed, further from the edge and closer to him.

He curled himself around her and felt the same longing in his chest he'd felt on their visit. It didn't escape him that she hadn't said she loved him too, and that was fine—as long as she knew how he felt and entered into this willingly, he didn't mind if she needed time. No, it was mostly muscle memory that settled that feeling in his chest, but also… worry. He'd overheard her shouting match with Quincy, back when this all had been just getting started. Not that he was taking Quincy's word for anything, but if Rachel really didn't have people, if, perhaps, she _avoided_ having people in order to protect herself from caring, then yes, he was worried.

Maybe she would decide it wasn't worth the risk. Maybe she would rather be alone than in fear of losing him. And wasn't he afraid, too? It was too late to keep from loving her, but he could still protect himself, be the one who said it wasn't worth the risk and go back to his life before.

No. He pressed his face to her hair, his arms wrapped tight around her as he breathed her in. He wasn't one to back down from a challenge, to cower in front of fear. Whatever else happened, he would face it head on, as he did any fight. If he had to fight for her, he would.

For now, he knew he was only borrowing trouble. They were back home, he was on leave, and he would love her as long as she would let him. That was all that mattered now.

His face still pressed to her hair, he murmured, "I love you," and she shifted back into him, mumbling something that could have been a response before sighing back into sleep, and he forced himself to relax. Nothing for it but to sleep.

xxx

He woke up to an empty bed and a sense of loss so instant and aching it stole the breath from his chest. It wasn't until he sat up that he saw the comm, placed with intention in the very centre of the other pillow, and his heart leapt. When he unlocked the screen, he found a message from Rachel— _Gone home for clean clothes (!) call me when you wake up xx_ —and slowly started breathing again. Comparing the timestamp to the current time, she'd been gone for an hour and he must have been sleeping like a rock.

He hit the vidcomm button and she answered almost instantly, grinning at the screen.

"Morning, sleepyhead," she said cheerily.

"You look refreshed," he said, smiling back. "I'm a little embarrassed I slept so much longer."

"Well," she said, the background whooshing past her as she turned and flopped down on her couch. "The only conclusion I can come to is that _babysitting me_ took more out of you than me actually _making the cure_."

He shook his head but couldn't actually deny it, and she knew it, watching him smugly.

"So, I'm starved," she went on. "Wanna meet me at the dining hall?"

"Definitely not," he said seriously before laughing at her startled expression. "I need to shower. I don't suppose you…"

She tilted her head, showing him her wet hair in a bun, and looked up again to say, "I think you'll have more success without me. I'll be at your door in half an hour?"

The apprehension in that question mark astounded him, as if she honestly doubted the answer, but he just met her eyes and said, "Sounds perfect. See you then."

She fluttered her fingers at him and ended the call, and he checked the time again before heading into the bathroom. Twenty-seven minutes later, he walked out the door and glanced left, turning and shutting the door and finding Rachel leaning up against the wall on the other side of the door. She pushed upright, her hair still damp where it hung down her back in a braid, and she approached him with a smile and her hands clasped behind her back, suddenly shy.

He reached out to her and she walked all the way up to his chest, tilting her chin up as he wrapped his arms around her and leaned down to kiss her, and she smiled again against his lips, her arms coming up around his waist and hugging him tightly.

When she stepped back, she clasped her hands behind her back again and he wrapped one arm around her shoulders as they turned to walk down the hall to the dining room. A few steps later, she unclasped her hands and wrapped her corresponding arm around his waist, and he felt his heart buoy a little more.

"You must really be starving if you've been up for hours," he said. "You shouldn't have waited for me."

"True," she said, "and true. But I did."

He tugged her into his side, turning his head to kiss her temple, and when they lined up for their meal Chandler leaned across the counter and said to the serving woman, "Excuse me, but Dr. Scott here missed dinner last night while distributing the cure to the virus, is there any way she could get double portions?"

The woman stared at Rachel, who was staring at the counter, and said, " _The_ Dr. Scott?"

"That's right," Chandler replied. "The one and only."

"Well, she can have triple portions if she likes. How about you, sir?" She glanced down to where their hips were pressed together even as they both held their trays, their hands close on the counter as Rachel's pinkie poked into Chandler's palm. "You want triple portions too?"

"I think we'll both be fine with double," Chandler said, grinning proudly. "Thank you very much."

Their plates were piled high when they made it to their table, and Rachel murmured, "That was mildly embarrassing."

"Guess you're not hungry enough," Chandler said, reaching for her plate, and she slapped his hand away with a feral glare.

Picking up her fork, she plunged it into the pile of food and held it up, staring at it contemplatively. "What I meant to say was… thank you." She filled her mouth and pressed her lips into a smile, cheeks puffed out, and he grinned again in response, tipping an invisible hat.

"You're welcome." He watched her eat, letting his own plate grow cold, and she avoided his eyes, looking around the room at the people she'd lived among her whole life, some of them gone now and the rest of them alive because of her. Once he was sure she was eating, he turned to his food and felt his stomach grumble viciously under the muscles of his abdomen, thankful that the room was noisy enough to conceal it.

Their plates cleared, Chandler took both trays to the disposal area and met Rachel at the door. They walked back to the living units in silence, Rachel's arms wrapped around her belly as Chandler kept his in his pockets, and he would have worried if it weren't for the fact she stopped in front of his door and waited for him to unlock it.

As soon as the door shut behind them, she moaned, and Chandler spun to face her.

"What's wrong?"

She lowered her chin and looked up past her lashes, arms still wrapped around her belly and a firm pout on her lips. "I ate too much," she whined, "too fast." She groaned again, and he stifled what wanted to be a guffaw into a tiny smile, wrapping his arm around her and guiding her to the couch.

They sat down and she curled up beside him, before stretching out along the couch and over his lap, both hands rubbing the dome of her stomach. He offered his hand and she let him settle it on her stomach, her hands resting on top of his as he stroked his palm down over her shirt, then slipped his hand under the fabric and rubbed across her skin. She turned onto her side, her feet poking over the arm at the end and her head resting on his thigh, her stomach pushed out like if she could only make it big enough it would stop hurting.

Another groan, pitiful, and he moved his other hand to pet her hair as she closed her eyes and pressed her face into the fabric of his pants. She fell asleep, just a little later, and he wasn't even surprised.

When she woke again, it was with a start, and he rubbed at his eyes, trying to pretend he hadn't fallen asleep as well. She sat up and looked at him, her face blank, and he yawned.

"You always jump out of sleep like that?"

"I dunno," she said, looking around the room. "Sometimes. Was I a whiny baby just before?"

His hand was still on her back, and he ran it up and down, then took it away when she continued to avoid his gaze. He wasn't sure what to do, so he told the truth. "No, sweetheart. You just needed a little comfort. Costs me nothing—actually, pays me more than that."

She was staring down at her hands in her lap, her fingers curling like she was putting all her focus into not forming them into fists, and he tipped his head back against the couch, keeping his eyes on her.

"I think we understand love very differently," he said, and she flinched, and he went on quickly, "No, that isn't a criticism. People love differently, that's how relationships work. I'm just not sure you know that when… when I say that I love you… what I'm trying to say is that I have, well, I have this big heart that just wants to give to you, and whatever you take from me, it doesn't leave a deficit. It all comes back. If you need something, ask for it."

She shook her head. "I can't make demands of you—just because you—"

"Yeah. You can. That's how it works."

She tilted her head at her lap, and her hands had closed all the way now, but loosely. "No. That's when people leave."

He watched her a moment in silence, both of them stone-still, and then he said very softly, "Those people weren't me."

Her jaw flexed, fists clenched. "What if…" She seemed to struggle to speak, to force her jaws apart long enough to form words. "What if I love you the wrong way… or not enough… What if my love isn't good enough."

His heart stopped and broke at the same time, his breath caught by hope and crushed by despair. "Do you love me?"

She squeezed her eyes shut, her fists shaking in her lap, and nodded, and he had to reach out and gather her to his chest, all of the tension and doubt coming with her as he held all of it in his arms, cradling the storm inside her.

"That's all I need, baby. That's enough." She didn't relax, and he thought at any moment she would be fighting him, tearing her way out of his arms, and so he dipped his chin and pressed his face to her hair and said softly, "It's fine if you need time, but I'm not them and I never will be, and maybe you've never seen me love someone, but let me show you. Please. Let me show you."

She didn't soften, melt, or relax; she let him hold her, and then she moved away, to the other side of the couch. She folded her hands in her lap, and sat up straight, but the fighting tension seemed to have left her. She looked over at him, her eyes calm even as they didn't quite meet his, and said, "That sounds fair."

"Okay." He sighed, propping his elbow on the couch arm and resting his head on the heel of his hand. "I'll take fair."

Looking down at her hands again, she slid one of them across her leg and down onto the couch cushion, her palm flat and fingers splayed, and she inched it across the space between them. He watched her face, reaching his own hand out slowly to hover over hers, and then he let it down and curled his fingers around hers, and she crossed the space between them in an instant, pressing up against his side and clutching his hand, and he wrapped his other arm around her waist to hold her close.

"Believe it or not," she said, "I didn't wake up this morning intending to kill the mood with emotional crises."

"You were happy this morning," he agreed, "but to be fair, I think I'm the one who made you talk about it."

She set her head on his shoulder and said, "That's okay. I guess maybe you can't always solve problems by ignoring them… or by shouting."

He smiled. "Maybe."

A sigh, and she snuggled closer into his side and said, "Can we watch a movie? I need to not think for a while."

"That reminds me," he said, shifting slightly to work his comm out of his pants pocket. "I mean, of course we can—but did you see the invitation?"

"Oh!" She lifted her head to look at him. "A banquet, right?"

"A captain's banquet," he confirmed, "for everyone who served on the Nathan James." He used his comm to reveal the hidden screen on the opposite wall and opened the menu of movies. "I don't suppose you want to be my date." His eyes were still on the screen as she scanned his face.

"That should draw notice."

He shrugged slightly, trying not to jostle her. "Honestly, who's gonna be shocked? And—do we have another option?"

Laying her head back down, she looked toward the screen. "S'pose not. It would be ridiculous to attend separately."

"That's what I'm saying. I'm not that good an actor."

"And skipping it would cause just as much of a stir."

"That's a yes, then."

"Yeah!" she said, pointing at the screen. "That one. Also, yes, it's a yes."

He smirked, selecting the movie, and slid down the cushion a bit to get more comfortable. Checking the length of the movie against the current time, he said, "Okay, we have plenty of time. Ready to stop thinking?"

She took in a breath, held it, then exhaled and said, "Ready," and he pressed play.

xxx

With an hour before the time on the invitation, Rachel went back to her unit to change and Chandler went to his closet. For simplicity, day clothes on the Earthship were colour-coded by profession, but their one formal outfit offered them the luxury of choice—once, and then you were stuck with that until a) it wore out or b) you grew out of it, which didn't happen much since a) formal clothes were rarely worn, and b) portions were carefully controlled and significant changes in weight were considered cause for concern.

Their day/work/sleep clothes were all designed for practicality and durability first and foremost, but formalwear allowed touches of fragility, like buttons and delicate fabrics—provided you were ready and willing to repair any flaws yourself, which was a given.

Chandler's outfit consisted of a sharp black shirt that buttoned up the front, tucked into dark gray slacks, with a black leather belt. It was an outfit that evoked ancient Earth movies, and he always felt like he was wearing a costume, if an appealing one, when he had it on.

He'd never seen Rachel in formalwear, and when he arrived at her door to walk with her to the banquet, he waited in the hall with butterflies swarming in his stomach. (Nobody ever needed to know that.) When she walked out a moment later, it was in a pair of sleek, deep purple pants with a matching blouse, and something fancier about her braid, though he couldn't name what. In the movies, she would have been wearing a dress, but he had no interest in complaining.

She turned to him after pulling her door shut, walked up and rested her hands on his chest, smoothing up over the fabric of his shirt and under his collar. "Aren't we fancy," she said, and he smiled, leaning down to kiss her.

"You look beautiful," he said, and added thoughtfully, "but you know you always look beautiful."

She fought her smile, trying to duck away and hide her face even as he wrapped his arms around her waist and kept her close. He leaned down again, his nose grazing her cheek before she turned back to accept his kiss, and a wolf whistle sounded out from the other side of the hall.

They looked up, seeing O'Connor and Miller walking by in their finery on the way to the banquet hall, and Chandler gave them a look.

"Way to go, Captain!" O'Connor called out, making the OK hand sign, Miller grinning beside him.

Chandler rolled his eyes to the ceiling, then looked back down at Rachel and shook his head, and her smile now was apprehensive.

"Are you sure about this?"

He released her waist and took her hand instead, and they started walking down the hall in the direction everyone else was. "Imagine me caring more about immature comments than about holding your hand. Imagine it, because you're never gonna see it."

Rachel laughed, tugging on his hand as she leaned away and then back, and they made it the rest of the way to the banquet hall before she hesitated on the threshold, holding her breath.

"It's gonna be fine," he said, and she smiled up at him.

"Of course," she said, turning back to stare into a room that was already milling with people. "Of course it will be."

He was considering just dragging her into the room when Kara and Danny came up behind them.

"Oh, thank god," Kara said, tapping the index finger of her free hand on top of Chandler and Rachel's clasped hands. "You two will be our buffer couple." Her belly was noticeable in what must have been a specially chosen formal outfit from the ship's collection of maternity wear, and Danny was looking almost as nervous as Rachel.

Rachel laughed again, breathy with relief, and gave Kara a one-armed hug. "What, are we the only ones?"

Stepping up beside her, Kara peered into the room. "I don't know," she said. "Maybe. But we can face it together, right?"

"Sure," Rachel said, finally taking a step into the room. She looked up at Chandler again. "Let's go."

The room was dimly lit and there was music playing, so Chandler and Rachel made it all the way to the drinks table with little notice, and then they released the security blanket of each other's hand to manage drinks and finger food. On their way to the edge of the room, their path was interrupted by a very unimpressed-looking Tex.

"Hello there," Rachel said awkwardly as Tex planted his feet and crossed his arms over his chest.

"Is this a date?" he said, slightly incredulous, and Rachel gasped.

She turned to Chandler, elbowing him gently, and said, "Good god, Tom, this isn't a _date_ , is it?"

"Fuck's sake, Tex," Tom said flatly, looking at him sideways. "I had her good and fooled. You just cheated me out of a full evening of fake-dating. Now I'll have to…"

"Well," Rachel said, leaning against his arm as she took a tiny bite from a cracker. "Enjoy the rest of your real date, I guess."

"Oh, yeah."

"Very funny," Tex said dryly. "I was just surprised this block of granite—" He kicked lightly at one of Chandler's shoes. "—actually moved fast enough to get a date to the friggin' welcome home banquet."

Rachel raised her eyebrows, turning to Tom and putting the rest of the cracker in her mouth, shutting her mouth and chewing and definitely _not_ commenting on that.

Chandler, for his part, stared across the room at the opposite wall, blinking a few times and then saying, "I'm just full of surprises."

Tex looked from one of them to the other, clearly sensing that there was some mystery there but hopefully having no idea what it was. Eventually, he rolled his eyes and said, "Enjoy your night," before walking off to go bother someone else.

Rachel and Chandler headed toward the perimeter again, wandering and greeting friends until everyone was asked to take their seats for dinner. Presumably nobody had had time to make seating charts, which was good since Chandler wasn't sure they would have seated him and Rachel together. They ended up at a table with the other officers… and Tex and his daughter.

The captain gave a little speech thanking them for their service, pointing out Rachel and Tom in particular for developing the cure and leading the mission respectively. He also mentioned that everyone who served would have _two_ weeks of leave, which earned him a hearty cheer.

When he was finished, and the first course was being served, Tex leaned into Tom's personal space and said, "So, tell me all about the grand romance of the past twenty-four hours."

"Shoulda known it would be Tex," Chandler muttered to Rachel, as they paused to allow servers to set their dishes down.

Once they were out of the way, Rachel leaned across and said, low enough that only Tex and Chandler could hear, "We got off the ship and couldn't keep our hands off each other. That's what you want to hear, right?"

Shuddering, Tex leaned back in his chair. "Not exactly."

"Well, don't ask if you don't want to hear the answer."

"I just have this feeling there's more to this than you're saying."

"And it will stay that way!" Rachel exclaimed, picking up her fork and stabbing it toward the middle of the table. "Honestly, Tex, I don't know why you would have any interest in knowing this at all."

Chandler was sitting silent in the middle, but now he said, "To rile you, I think."

Rachel blew out a breath, spearing at her food with her fork. "I get that that's fun for you, Tex, but for me it's just annoying."

"Okay, ouch." Tex reached for his glass, taking a drink and then setting it down, silent for a moment. "I'm curious, okay, sue me, but I'm not tryna ruin your evening. Truce?" He held out his hand, which Rachel shook grudgingly.

"You must have something else to talk about," she added mildly, and Tex gamely recounted his reunion with his daughter, introducing her to everyone at the table.

The rest of the meal was spent eating and discussing possible plans for their leave. There weren't _too_ many options on the ship—Chandler would probably work out a lot, and Rachel would probably, well, work. He did enjoy the plural pronoun that got thrown around— _we_ haven't thought about it much, and _we_ will probably spend most of it on the couch, and so on. His officers gave him some long looks, but they were wise enough not to comment, and Tex had been sufficiently chastised to let it pass.

By the end of the night, it was very obvious to anyone who would look that Rachel and Tom were together, so at least that was over with. He walked her back to her unit, and she invited him in, wrapping herself around him as soon as the door was shut.

They stood in the entryway, Rachel with her arms around his chest and her cheek against his shirt, and he said, "Sorry about Tex."

"Tex is Tex," she said back. "As long as he doesn't try to get us in trouble, which he won't, it's fine. Although I am amused that he's apparently imagining you as some Don Juan when all we've done since the ship docked is sleep."

Chandler scanned back over his memories of the last day and a bit, realizing that she was right. "So now I'm trying to figure out how I _actually_ would have gotten you to be my date to the welcome back banquet…"

"Yeah, don't do that." She leaned back enough to look up at him. "That's like me trying to figure out what this whole past year would have looked like if someone other than you was running that ship."

His face transformed to a mask of horror, eyes wide and seeing something awful. "Dear God. Would you have ended up with Tex?"

"I just told you _not_ to do that," she laughed, smacking the back of her hand lightly against his chest.

His arms still locked around her waist, he stared down at her for a minute and then said, "Yeah, everything happened the way it was supposed to."

Her eyes dropped to where her hands rested on his chest, a small smile playing about her lips, and he watched her for another minute before leaning down to kiss her. Tilting her chin back up, she slid her hands up to wrap around behind his neck, and he realized very suddenly that, yes, they really hadn't been together since—since they were married, way back on someone else's ship, in someone else's home, and when she rose up on her toes it was to turn and press her hip between his legs as she held onto his neck and he groaned into her mouth.

His hands slid apart to grip her hips and his body said to step forward, press her up against the wall and into the space between his legs, but her taste was intoxicating on his tongue and he wanted more of it, wanted to taste every part of her, so he stepped back, catching her hands in his and backing toward the bedroom. He was taking long strides, his eyes intent on hers as she followed determinedly, and so he collided with the bed and fell back onto it, Rachel landing on top of him and quickly moving to straddle his hips, swallowing another groan as she stole back the kiss and the contact he'd taken away.

"You have to—" he said. "Clothes."

She sat up, which only settled her more firmly on top of him, and he pressed his head back against the mattress, squeezing his eyes shut for an instant as his hand clutched at the blanket, and when he looked back at her she was pulling her blouse up over her head, dropping it to the floor as she leaned down to kiss him again, and he had to use all his will power to push her gently off of him onto the bed.

He stood up, and she was incredulous where she lay sprawled against the pillows, so he turned to the wall and started to unbutton his shirt. "I'm going to hang that up," he said. "Take your pants off."

A number of wordless, righteously indignant sounds were coming from Rachel's throat as she sat up on the bed, and he very purposefully didn't turn away from the wall until he was undressed, to find her already standing at the closet, her blouse on a hanger as she hung up her pants, clad only in her underwear.

She beckoned impatiently with one hand, and he walked over to hand her his shirt and hang up his slacks himself. When that was done, she planted her hands on her hips and said, "Satisfied?"

He grinned, grabbing her around the waist and picking her up off the floor, her feet kicking slightly as he carried her to the bed and dropped her on top of it. Hovering over her, one hand braced on the bed as he reached for her underwear with the other, he paused and said, "Are you mad at me?"

She smirked, her chin dipping toward her chest as she shook her head, and he kissed her again, tugging her underwear down and then pausing as he moved to the underside of her jaw, his lips pressed to the place where it met her neck. He had to stop there, inhaling deeply as his hand curved around her hip again, trying to fill his lungs with that scent that felt like a drug. She squirmed, and he traced his lips down to her collar bone, both his hands smoothing down over her hips before his lips were tracing the top edge of her bra and he had to reach up to unclasp it.

That scent was with him every inch of the way, as he breathed deeply and evenly and kissed his way down her body, spending extra time at the swell of her breast and the slight curve of her belly and the corner of bone that pressed up at her hip and she squirmed again when he lingered there.

"Impatient," he murmured into her skin, but moved immediately to the place where she wanted him, inhaling again and tracing his lips and tongue along her. She cried out, her turn to clutch at the blankets, and he smiled against her, taking his time as she twisted under him and babbled nonsense syllables that occasionally formed his name.

She came with another cry and he was grateful for soundproof walls, thin though they may be, and smug as he might secretly feel if someone heard his name from her tongue with that rough edge. He ran his hands back up over her smooth skin as he moved to lie beside her, his fingers stroking the curve of her waist and tracing over the muscles in her abdomen that shook under his caress.

He dipped his face into the curve of her neck for another breath of her, before taking her braid in one hand and removing the tie with the other. Stroking his fingers through the weaving of it, he worked from the end up, reaching the back of her head just as she collected herself enough to turn to him for a kiss. He let his fingers trace over her jaw and tangle in her hair on the other side of her as she worked her tongue into his mouth and reached for his own underwear.

A full-body twitch shook him as she pushed his underwear down and hooked her leg over his waist, guiding him inside of her and wrapping both her legs around him, his moan low in his throat and her heels pressing into the small of his back. He rolled her over, not wanting his weight to rest on her leg, and pushed up from the bed, breaking the kiss long enough to see the flush high on her cheeks, the haze in her eyes when they blinked open, and he said, "I love you," before kissing her again and moving his hips.

He worked her up again, his breaths coming short and fast as he pushed her, spent all his focus on her until she tipped over the edge and he could let go with a guttural groan. He stayed on top of her for a moment, his arms shaking slightly as he held himself just off of her, just enough for her to breathe, and he was not proud of the whimper that got caught in his throat when she wrapped her legs back around his waist.

She released him a second later and he rolled away, easing apart from her only for her to slide back toward him, wrapping an arm around him and tucking her head under his chin.

"You know," she said, and then broke off, like maybe she hadn't meant to say anything at all.

"Yeah?"

She hummed her indecision, her index finger tracing circles on his back, and he sighed, his hand coming up to sweep her hair away from where it clung damply at her neck, his thumb tracing up behind her ear, and she somehow snuggled even closer, pressing her cheek hard against his chest.

"I love you," she said finally, and he stopped moving, stopped breathing altogether. "That's what I wanted to say."

He closed his eyes, shallow breaths sneaking in and out of his lungs, and cradled her there in his arms before a smile started to struggle onto his lips. He stroked his thumb over the soft skin at her hairline, and relaxed into the bed, and she sighed and relaxed against him, and everything was just how it should be.

 _Let's keep travelling, travelling, in this skin, in this skin, 'til we get to the end of the line.  
Let us take a risk, take a risk, nothing missed, nothing missed, 'til we get to the end of the line._


End file.
